His Dusk, Her Dawn

Chapter 4. Best friend

9 years ago

I was finally in the fourth grade, which meant that I could take part in the elementary soccer team. I had been practicing my skills since last year, and now it was finally time to showoff how amazing I was. I knew Mom was going to cheer for me as I would win the best player's trophy and make her proud.

I had topped in the whole grade last year, and the plan was the same for this year too. I was already done with the half of the syllabus for the first quarterly exams, so I had more time to play as much as I wanted. Dad was outstation, so Mom and I spent a lot of time together before she left abroad to meet my grandparents.

She was always traveling because of her job and didn't get much time for me, but I never complained because I knew she loved me and was doing everything to keep me happy. I was more close to her than my father. He was really strict.

Why couldn't he be lenient and soft spoken like Mom? Did he eat stones when he was a kid?

"Ved, you wanna come outside?" Ayush asked.

"Sure." I nodded.

We both left the classroom, and I thought that we were going alone to the playground to enjoy the rest of our recess, but Ayush stopped in front of the staffroom and told me to wait for Sandhya to come.

"Why are you calling her to hang out with us?" I complained.

"Please, Ved. She is a nice girl. She even gave me half of her chocolate yesterday," Ayush said.

I rolled my eyes. "She is really weird. Aren't you my best friend? If you play with her, then I won't talk to you."

"She isn't weird," he defended. "Just a bit too friendly, nothing else."

"Whatever."

I had to stay against my wish, and soon, Sandhya came outside of the staff room with a huge smile on her stupid face. She told Ayush that our English teacher gave her an A+ for the recent essay and had called her to praise her.

"How can you lie so efficiently?" I accused her.

"What?" she asked.

"You are not the only one who got an A+, okay? So stop acting like you won a trophy. And what about this English teacher praising you for the essay? You wrote with a golden pen or what?"

"Looks like Bird's nest is burning with jealousy," she taunted. "Say whatever you want, but I know my essay was the best."

She smirked at me and took out four candies from her skirt's pocket. She counted them slowly and gave one to Ayush. Then, she counted them again and gave one more to my friend. I narrowed my eyes at her when she purposely gave the third candy to Ayush and wondered about what to do with the fourth one.

"Do you want it, Ved?" she asked in a fake sweet voice.

"I don't eat trash." I huffed.

"Of course, how can you eat someone from your own species?"

She giggled and popped the last toffie in her mouth. I clenched my fists and moved towards her, but Ayush pulled me back and gave me one of his candies. I refused, and he shrugged. As we went to the playground, I complained to Ayush to stay away from Sandhya, and as usual, he didn't agree.

"What's your problem with her? I understand that you don't want to be friends with her, but why are you stopping me?" he grumbled.

"Why can't you get it? She likes to pull pranks and acts like an innocent person. You remember how she stuck glue on my chair on the first day?"